The Notion Of Time In Dogs

They say a dog is happy when he comes home, whether he has been gone for five minutes or three days. They blame this on the rumor that pets have no sense of time. Now what is true about this? How do dogs measure time?

In fact, this topic is very interesting, so we believe that we should dedicate a space to talk about it.

how dogs measure time

We can measure time thanks to the clocks we have. Yes, many will say they could do it roughly even without a clock, but that’s because we’ve had clocks before and we’re able to associate daylight with the time we more or less knew what it was.

However, dogs go further, they measure time through circadian cycles and sensory perception. Let’s look at each of them.

Notion of time through circadian cycles

First of all, let’s know what circadian cycles are. All the instinctual impulses that dogs have, whether to eat, drink, breed or play, are marked by these cycles.

These cycles are closely related to the Earth’s rotation and translation cycles, as they are the ones that mark the light and dark throughout the day. Therefore, the animal’s biological clock is associated with these cycles, sensing light and dark, and coming to understand what time of day each moment represents.

For example, between 6 pm and 6 am, there are these bodily changes that the animal is able to recognize:

• 4:30 pm – Maximum blood pressure
• 7:00 pm – Higher body temperature
• 9 pm – Melatonin secretion
• 10:30 pm – Farewell to bowel movements
• 2 am – Very deep sleep
• 4:30 am – Lower body temperature

Between 6 am and 6 pm, the following happens:

• 6:45 am – Blood pressure rises
• 7:30 am – Melatonin stops being secreted

• 8:30 am – Bowel movement
• 10 am – Alert State
• 2:30 pm – Good coordination
• 17:30 pm – Muscle efficiency

These circadian rhythms let your dog know what time of day he is. In addition, you must respect them when educating your pets, training them or when they compete, thus, you will help your furry friend to have maximum physical and mental performance, without causing any harm to the animal.

The notion of time: sensory perception

Just as we can sense time passing by using our senses, dogs can sense time through their senses.

For example, with their vision, even if they see in black and white, they can deduce the amount of light that enters through the windows and know if it’s time to go home.

Smell is another sense that plays a fundamental role in dogs’ sense of time. As you move away from the house, the dog’s perception of odor diminishes because he knows you’ve left. However, when you approach the house, he is able to smell it meters away, and therefore memorize that moment to recognize it every day as the moment of his arrival. And smell is the canine sense that is most closely related to memory.

So, summing up, in the end, dogs’ sense of time has to do with their instincts, as they can relate the circumstances around them to the moment they find themselves. Therefore, a dog is not happy if you went out for five minutes or if you went out for three days, because even though they don’t have a watch, they recognize that the cycles we’ve discussed happened many times when their owner was out of the house longer.